An inventory for assessment of the health needs of Iranian female adolescents.

Health needs assessment is a first step to planning adolescent health programmes but it needs to be socioculturally relevant to the target population. This study aimed to develop an instrument to assess the health needs of Iranian female adolescents and evaluate its psychometric properties. Content analysis was applied to explore the health needs of female adolescents through focus group discussions with adolescents and in-depth interviews with key informants. Five themes were identified: educational needs, and emotional, social, physical and spiritual health needs. A scale-level content validity index of 0.92 was obtained. The factor structure was identified by principal component analysis; 5 factors were extracted which accounted for 44.89% of the variance. Reliability of the instrument was demonstrated with a Cronbach alpha of 0.90 for the entire scale. Consistency was established with test-retest reliability with an interval of 2 weeks (intracluster correlation coefficient = 0.984, P < 0.001). There was a negative correlation with the Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory (r = -0.66, P < 0.001). The instrument is culturally sensitive with satisfactory validity and reliability and could be used for planning of adolescent health services.